Bottle closure



Jmke 24, 1930.

F. O'NEILL, JR I BOTTLE CLOSURE Filed April 23, 1928 Patented June 24, 1930 UNITED STATES PATENT OFFICE FRANK ONEILL, JR., OF NEW YORK, N. Y.,

ASSIGNOR T EMPIRE HOOD SEAL CORPO- BOTTLE CLOSURE Application filed April 23,

My invention relates to bottle closures and in particular to those for milk bottles in the form of a cap or hood that covers the bottle mouth and overlaps the sides, and, generally stated, my object is to provide a closure of this type having the law-required safeguards of sealing, which shall be tamper-proof and which will have data such as address and date of bottling most advantageously placed,

and which having these important things may have them at the minimum cost to the bottler.

My invention consists in whatever is described by or is included within the terms or scope of the appended claims.

In the drawings:

Fig. 1 is a top plan View of a cap embodying my invention in the flat or opened out form;

Fig. 2 is a vertical section of the mouth aud'neck portion of a milk bottle with a cap embodying my invention secured thereto;

Fig. 3 is a horizontal section on a larger scale on the line 33 of Fig. 2;

Fig. 4 is a similar view showing in dotted and full lines, intermediate steps in the cap securing and sealing operation.

A bottle cap or closure embodying my in vention is made of flexible sheet material, such as a heavy paper or cardboard, which, by scores or lines of weakness and incisions at numerous points, provide radially extending tongues or fingers from a substantially fiat central portion which overlies the mouth of the bottle and which radially extending portions are bendable downward over the bottle neck from the mouth and which overlap in a circular direction and with free end edges or extremities of certain of such radial portions united or secured together by a metal clip that performs the double function of securing the cap to the bottle mouth and prevents tampering with- 4 out discovery.

In practice the cap blanks are in a strip, ,edge to edge, so that a roll containing a great number may be supplied to a capping and sealing machine so that a cap at a time will be presented to a bottle top, and the 1928. Serial No. 272,237.

clips are in the form of a ribbon of sheet metal in a roll supplied to the machine so that thus caps and clips are delivered to the bottle capping and sealing point in the machine, butas the machine forms no part of the present invention, it is not necessary to show the same in the drawings nor to deseribethe same, but the detail descri tion will be confined to an explanation o the forms of the caps and clips and the procedure followed or employed in folding the cap over the mouth of the bottle and applying the clip and supplying that part of the data which the cap must carry to identify it with the place and time of bottling.

The cap, in the flat or blank form, has a central unscored and uncut portion, 10, of an area to extend over the bottle mouth which, at equal-distant points circumferentially, has, by suitable scores or incisions, radially extending fingers which, as shown in the drawings, are eight in number, four of them being situated at points that, for convenience, may be termed diametrical points and these four being alike, and the remaining four being, for convenience of designation, termed diagonal and lying each between a pair of diametrical fingers and these four in the body portions being alike and two being different but similar to one another in that at their outer ends they have each an extension or projection absent in the others. The four diametrically extending fingershave each, what may be designated, a stem portion, 11, radiating from the central body, 10, and a lateral extension, 12, at each side, and the diagonal fingers have each a stem portion, 13, and each of two opposite diagonal fingers has a lateral angular extension, 14, with an edge adjacent the free end of a lateral extension of the diametrical finger and these stems are formed or defined by substantially radially extending scores or indentations, 15. When the cap blank is applied to the bottle month, by suitable members of the machine, the various radial fin gers are folded down over the outer sides of the neck so that the lateral extensions of the diametrical fingers overlap the diagonal fingers and have their free edges turned towards one another and alining, and adapted to be joined by the folded over metal clip,

16, that interlocks with the doubled-over extremities of said lateral extensions.

By reference to Fig. 3, it will be seen that the extremity of the finger, 12, is folded around the end of the clip through approximately 180, the finger extremity being thus doubled back upon itself with the clip end between the folds. This doubling over even without any tight inching or clamping action firmly interloc s finger and clip against withdrawal of the finger. An pull on the paper to release the gripped en of the finger would result in tearing the paper before it would pull around the edge of the interlapped clip.

Referring to Fig. 4, the metal clip, 16, existing originally in a flat state, is first given the form that includes a V-shape central portion with a lateral extensionnof each limb of the V which V-shape portion is thrust between the outturned extremities of adjacent lateral extensions, 12, and next the lateral extensions from the V-shape central portion are, as shown in full lines in Fig. 4, lapped over such extremities of the lateral extensions, 12, giving to the clip in this stage a W-shape, and then by the further action of the machine the clip and overlapped portions of the extensions, 12, are pressed into the flat interlocked tight condition shown in Fig. 3 making it extremely diflicult, if not impossible, to remove the clip without leaving evidence of the removal. However, to increase the difiiculty of the removal without detection, the clip has spurs, 17, which in the final flattening operation are projected into the adjacent paper of the cap.

The central top portion of the cap and the marginal portions of the radial 'arms afl'ord spaces for advertising and other matter without in any degree impairing the neat and attractive appearance of the cap. The diagonal fingers, and in particular those which have the lateral extensions, are particularly available for the address of the bottling plant and the date of bottling, one being used for the address and the other for the date which is given as the day of the week, and the day is given on the portion of the diagonal finger with the lateral extensions, which, though there is overlapping of the lateral extensions, 12, joined by the metal clip, 16, lies beyond the clipped overlapping portions and so the date thereon is conspicuously visible. The ca blanks are coated with parafiine to make t em water-proof. Any ink printing that is to be done on the caps must, therefore, be done before they have their parafiine bath, since it is impossible to print with ink upon parafline. Many bottling plants may be supplied with caps from one cap-making plant,

and with the printing done before paraffining obviously a stock of caps for each bottling plant produced at the cap-making plant would be required and a stock of seven different kinds of caps for each plant, one for each day of the week. I avoid the necessity of providing and carrying this great stock by applying the name or address of the bottling plant and the day of the week by cutting or perforating the cap with the necessary letters and/or numerals which, of course, can be done notwithstanding the previous parafiining of the caps, and each bottling plant 'may have, as a part of its capping machine equipment, the proper dies or per orating devices for the address of that bottling plant and the day of the week. Since the name of each day of the week ends with day that syllable can be printed at the cap-making plant in ink before'paraffining and hence the die or cutting device at the bottling plant need be enough to cut or perforate the syllable or syllables necessary to complete the name of the day of the week. Since the prolongations or extensions at the free ends of certain of the diagonal fingers are utilized for the cutting or perforating operation, the holes or cuts made in the cap do not impair the hygienic feature of the cap because the holes or perforations or cuts are situated considerably below the lip of the bottle. Another advantage of this protrusion or projection of certaln of the radial fingers is that they can be used as a means to lift the hood and to break the seal and remove the hood-form cap from the bottle without the necessity to use any tool for that purpose.

Preferably, to safeguard against the tearing or cutting off of the portion of the finger carrying the day of the week, the word Date is printed on that portion of the finger which is above the sealing clip, 16, so that with that word present calling attention to the date, the absence of the day of the week on the extremity of the finger will show at once that the bottle has been tam red with.

T e scores or indentations 15 are so constructed and arranged that, during the folding down of the fingers of the cap blank they produce in the cap, intermediate the lateral extensions 12 and the body portion 10, substantially vertically arranged folds. These folds produce a cushioning effect in the cap in that, although the body portion 10 is normally maintained taut, the permit suflicient yield to the cap to reclu 0 breaking or tearing thereof shouiii any unusual pressure be applied thereto, such, for example, as might be caused by placing there on a piece, of ice, as is frequently done in the transportation of bottles of milk.

An important feature of this invention resides in having the unbroken body portion stem of the cap extend not only over the mouth of the bottle but also downwardly over the lip thereof, thereby precluding entrance into the bottle of any water, dirt or other foreign matter. It will be observed, from an inspection of the drawings, that the portions of the cap blank between the parts constituting the stems l3 and 14 are unbroken. Therefore as the cap blank is folded over the bottle the blank folds along the identations or scores 15 and that portion of the cap blank becomes an underlying unbroken shield which extends Well over the lip of the bottle and downwardly along the side thereof. With this construction should any foreign matter find its way into the folds of the cap such matter would be diverted downwardly behind the portions 1:2 and down the side of the bottle and would be positively prevented from entering the mouth of the bottle.

This is a decidedly important sanitary feature which can best be appreciated by remembering that, as usually delivered, bottled milk is subjected to the elements, to street dirt, etc.

Although this invention has been described particularly in connection with bottle capping and the retaining clips have been referred to as formed of metal it is to be understood that the invention is equally adaptable to various other types of containers and the retaining clips may be made of any other suitable material, such for example as celluloid, etc.

Nothing herein is intended to waive any patentable featureof applicants co-pending application Serial No. 340,409, filed February 16,1929.

lVhat I claim is:-

1. In combination with a mouth, a container closure consisting of a piece of material having a central portion overlying the mouth of the container and a plurality of bendable marginal fingers folded downwardly over the lip of the container mouth, alternate ones of said fingers having portions overlying intermediate fingers, said portions being turned back upon themselves substantially 180 degrees thereby forming hooked extremities; and a retaining clip interlocked with the adjacent hooked extremities of two of said fingers.

2. A container closure consisting of a piece of bendable material having an unbroken central portion overlying the mouth of a container and a plurality of marginal fingers folded downwardly over the lip of the container mouth, alternate ones of said fingers being of substantially T-shape and each comprising a stem portion and portions projecting laterally from opposite s des of said portion and extending circumferentially about the container, said laterally projecting portions overlying intermediate mara container having ginal fingers of said cap and having their ends turned back upon themselves to form hooked extremities; and a plurality of fastening clips of flattened C-shape each having its marginal portions interlocked with the adjacent turned-back portion of two of said fingers, said clips being in gripping contact with said turned back portions.

3. The combination set forth in claim 1 in which one of the intermediate underlying marginal fingers extends downwardly adjacent the body of the container below the overlapping portions and below the retaining clip, and affords a finger-grip for removing the closure from the container.

4. The combination set forth in claim 1 in which one of the intermediate underlying marginal fingers extends downwardly along the body of the container below the overlapping portions and below the retaining clip, and is provided with indieia showing when the closure was applied to the contamer.

5. A container cap blank comprising a sheet of bendable material having a central body portion and marginal fingers of different extent radially, the shorter fingers laterally projecting portions adapted, when the blank is placed upon a container mouth and the marginal downwardly over the lip thereof, to extend circumferentially about the container and to ovcrlie the longer fingers, the longer fingers being adapted to project below the overlapping portions of the shorter fingers, one of said longer fingers being provided initially with a portion of the name of a day of the week, said portion being common to the name of each day of the week.

(1. In combination with a container, a closure therefor consisting of a piece of waterproofed material having a central portion overlying the mouth of the container and a plurality of bendable marginal fingers of different extent radially folded downwardly over the lip of the container mouth, nate ones of said fingers overlying intermediate fingers; one of the underlying fingers extending below the overlying portions of the other fingers and havmg printed thereon a syllable or part of the having subsequently ance of one of said names.

7. A container cap blank, as set forth in claim 5 in which the portion of the name of the day is so located on the radial finger as to admit of subsequently adding thereto the balance of the name so that the whole name of the day will be visible when the cap blank is applied to a container, and in which the blank carries means to call attention to the presence of said name.

8. The combination set forth in claim 1 fingers are folded telling the address of the place where the closure was applied.

9. In combination with a container, a hoodcap fitted over the mouth and lip of the contalner and held thereon by contraction beneath said lip, said cap comprising a piece of bendable material affording a central portion overlying the mouth of the container and a plurality of marginal fingers of different extent radially folded downwardly over the lip thereof, alternate ones of said fingers having laterally extending portions extending circumferentially about the lip and overlying intermediate fingers, said later'all extending portions having their ends turned back to form hooked extremities, a retaining clip interlocked with each adjacent pair of said hooked extremities to maintain the lowor portion of said cap contracted beneath the greatest diameter of said lip, one of the underlying fingers extending downwardly below the lower edge of the hooked extremities of two of said fingers and their connecting clip and being provided with indicia to indicate when the cap was applied to the container.

10. A container cap blank comprising a sheet of material having a central body portion and bendable marginal fingers of different extent radially, alternate ones of said fingers having laterally projecting portions adapted, when the blank is placed upon the container mouth and the ,marginal fingers are folded downwardly over the lip thereof, to extend circumferentially about the container and to overlie intermediate fingers, of said blank, two of the intermediate fingers being of greater length radially than the fingers having the laterally projecting portions and being adapted to extend therebelow when the cap is applied to a container, one of said two fingers having initially printed thereon a portion of the name of a period of time and the remainder of said name being subsequently applied thereto in a different manner, the entire name indicating the date or time when/the cap is applied to a container, and the other of said two fingers being adapted to receive other indicia, such as the address of the plant in which the closure was applied.

11. A container cap compri ing a central body portion overlying the mouth of a container, and bendable marginal fingers folded down over the li .of the container mouth, alternate ones 0 said fingers overlapping intermediate fingers, aportion of said overlapping fingers being form a hooked extermity; and means engagfolded fingers forming folded backwardly to ing each adjacent pair of said hooked extremities to prevent separation of said overlapping fingers thereby precluding expansion of said cap.

12. The method of applying a cap to a container which consists in placing over a container a blank of bendable material formed with a central body portion adapted to overlie the mouth of the container and radial fingers adapted to be folded down over the lip of the container mouth; folding alternate ones of said fingers over the container lip; placing partially formed clips about said container lipexteriorly of t e folded fingers; folding the remaining fingers over the container lip into overlapping relation with the first folded fingers and into contact with said partially formed clips, and simultaneously turning back marginal portions of the last folded fingers to form hooked extremitiesand completing the formation of said clips thereby causing each of them to interlock with adjacent hooked extremities of two of the last folded fingers.

13. The method of capping a container which consists in forming a container cap blank of bendable material with a central body portion and radial fingers, placing said blank in sheet form over a container with the central body portion over the container mouth, folding alternate ones of said fingers over the lip o the container mouth; folding the remaining fingers over the container lip and into overlapping relation with the first hooked extremities on the last folded fingers; engaging a retaining clip with adjacent pairs of sa1d hooked extremities; and flattening said clip and hooked extremities into binding contact.

14. The method of capping a container which consists in forming a container cap blank of bendable material with a central body portion and radial fingers of different length; initially appl ing to a lon er one! of said fingers a part 0 the name 0 a period of time ,common to different names of several periods of time; subsequently applying to said finger the balance of one of sai names; placing said blank in sheet form over a container with the central body portion over the mouth thereof; folding alternate finger over the container lip; folding the remaining fingers over the container lip and into overlapping relation with the first folded fingers; forming the last folded fingers;

taining clip with adjacent pairs of said hooked extremities onand engaging a recones of said fingers including said longer hooked extremities wholly above the name of the period of time carried by said longer finger.

15. In combination with a container having a mouth, a hood-cap fitted over the mouth of the container and held thereon by contraction beneath the lip thereof, said cap com rising a blank of bendable material afford ing a central portion overlying the mouth of the container and a plurality of marginal fingers folded downwardly over said lip, alternate ones of said fingers having laterally extending portions extending circumferentially about the container and overlying intermediate fingers, a clip interlocked with each adjacent pair of said hooked extremities to maintaln the lower portion of said cap contracted beneath the greatest diameter of said lip; the cap blank being initially formed intermediate adjacent fingers with scores or indentations which, during the folding of the cap on the container form, in said cap, folds which permit limited contraction of said cap and depression of said central portion.

In testimony whereof I hereunto aflix my signature.

FRANK ONEILL, J R. 

